Julian Assange says he intends to run for a Senate seat in the next election, with plans for an Australian WikiLeaks party “significantly advanced”. The Australian has been holed up in Ecuador’s London embassy since June in a bid to avoid extradition to Sweden, where he faces questioning over sexual assault allegations.

Mr Assange is concerned that if he goes to Sweden, authorities will allow him to be extradited to the United States to be questioned over WikiLeaks’ release of thousands of US diplomatic cables.

Mr Assange has told Fairfax Media he intends to push ahead with previously-announced plans to run for the Australian Senate. He said he had not yet registered to vote, but told Fairfax he believes he will be able to register in either New South Wales or Victoria as an overseas voter.

Mr Assange said a “strategic decision” would determine which state he would run to represent. He also said “a number of very worthy people admired by the Australian public” have expressed interest in standing for a yet-to-be registered Australian WikiLeaks party :: Read the full article »»»»

The global behemoth that is News (Ltd + International) is creeking and groaning under it’s own size as it attempts to reform itself for the digital age, changing the way it does business, answering for the way it’s done business and comes to terms with the trouble it’s had downsizing it’s business.

In the UK, the saga of phone-hacking goes on with Former News International chief Rebekah Brooks has appeared briefly in a London court, accused of conspiring to hack phones. As well as Brooks, former legal manager of Rupert Murdoch’s News International has been arrested in connection with the phone hacking scandal. In Australia the behemoth has not announced that up to 80 more editing and reporting jobs will be cut from News Limited, including dozens across Queensland.

The once golden Nine stable of multimedia products has dipped further into trouble times. Nine Entertainment has announced the sale of ACP Magazines – Australia’s largest stable of print based media – to German media giant Bauer. The sale is reported to be worth about $500 million and is expected to be finalised in the next one to two months.

No post would be complete without comment on Julian Assange, his latest antics – stuck within the shrinking walls of the Eucadorian Embassy in London – Mr Assange, or Our Jullian as we like to refer, is prepping himself for a 12 month camp-out as he steadies himself for waht looks like a very long fight. At what point does one need to ask the question; ‘surely he’d be done with the fight if he’d gone to Sweden 3 years ago?’

In proof that there is still some value in old-school communication devices, a Scottish fishing boat’s skipper has found a message in a bottle, 98 years after it was released. The bottle was released by the Glasgow School of Navigation in 1914 as part of an experiment to map the currents in the sea off the Scottish coast :: Read the full article »»»»

WikiLeaks – the behemoth that would be our galactic Yoda – has begun publishing more than 2 million emails from Syrian political figures that it says will shed light on the regime’s crackdown on dissent and embarrass Syria’s opponents. The emails date back to 2006 but also cover the past 16 months, in which thousands have been killed in a bloody crackdown by Syrian president Bashar al-Assad’s forces.

The whistleblowing website says the files will give an insight into how the Assad government operates, and also reveal Western countries and businesses which continue to support Syria. WikiLeaks says the emails came from Syrian ministries including foreign affairs, finance and presidential affairs.

In a statement on the website, Wikileaks says: “Today, Thursday 5 July 2012, WikiLeaks began publishing the Syria Files – more than two million emails from Syrian political figures, ministries and associated companies, dating from August 2006 to March 2012. This extraordinary data set derives from 680 Syria-related entities or domain names, including those of the Ministries of Presidential Affairs, Foreign Affairs, Finance, Information, Transport and Culture. Over the next two months, ground-breaking stories derived from the files will appear in WikiLeaks (global), Al Akhbar (Lebanon), Al Masry Al Youm (Egypt), ARD (Germany), Associated Press (US), L’Espresso (Italy), Owni (France) and Publico.es (Spain). Other publications will announce themselves closer to their publishing date“.

Australian WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange says the material is embarrassing to Syria, as well as to Syria’s opponents. It helps us not merely to criticise one group or another, but to understand their interests, actions and thoughts,” Mr Assange said in a statement. “It is only through understanding this conflict that we can hope to resolve it.” :: Read the full article »»»»

Julian Assange is seeking asylum in Ecuador in a last-ditch bid to avoid extradition to Sweden, where he is wanted for questioning over allegations of sexual assault. The Australian born founder of Wikileaks visited Ecuador’s embassy in London this morning to seek political asylum.

A statement on the embassy’s website said Ecuador was a signatory to the United Nations Universal Declaration for Human Rights and had an obligation to review all applications for asylum.

The decision to consider Mr Assange’s application for protective asylum should in no way be interpreted as the Government of Ecuador interfering in the judicial processes of either the United Kingdom or Sweden.

The statement from the Embassy of Ecuador in London said, “While the department assesses Mr Assange’s application, Mr Assange will remain at the embassy, under the protection of the Ecuadorian Government,” the statement said. “The decision to consider Mr Assange’s application for protective asylum should in no way be interpreted as the Government of Ecuador interfering in the judicial processes of either the United Kingdom or Sweden.”

On June 15, 2012 Britain’s Supreme Court has dismissed a bid by Australian WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange to reopen his appeal against extradition to Sweden over alleged sex crimes :: Read the full article »»»»

Julian Assange is seeking asylum in Ecuador in a last-ditch bid to avoid extradition to Sweden, where he is wanted for questioning over allegations of sexual assault. The Australian born founder of Wikileaks visited Ecuador’s embassy in London this morning to seek political asylum.

A statement on the embassy’s website said Ecuador was a signatory to the United Nations Universal Declaration for Human Rights and had an obligation to review all applications for asylum.

The decision to consider Mr Assange’s application for protective asylum should in no way be interpreted as the Government of Ecuador interfering in the judicial processes of either the United Kingdom or Sweden.

The statement from the Embassy of Ecuador in London said, “While the department assesses Mr Assange’s application, Mr Assange will remain at the embassy, under the protection of the Ecuadorian Government,” the statement said. “The decision to consider Mr Assange’s application for protective asylum should in no way be interpreted as the Government of Ecuador interfering in the judicial processes of either the United Kingdom or Sweden.”

On June 15, 2012 Britain’s Supreme Court has dismissed a bid by Australian WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange to reopen his appeal against extradition to Sweden over alleged sex crimes :: Read the full article »»»»

UPDATE: WikiLeaks suspect Bradley Manning has been formally charged ahead of a court martial that could see the United States soldier sentenced to life in prison. Manning was charged with 22 counts, the most serious of which is “aiding the enemy”, for allegedly turning over a trove of classified US documents to WikiLeaks in one of the most serious intelligence breaches in US history. The 24-year-old is accused of passing hundreds of thousands of military field reports from Iraq and Afghanistan and US diplomatic cables to WikiLeaks between November 2009 and May 2010, when he was serving in Iraq. The leak of the military documents shed light on civilian deaths, while the diplomatic cables sparked a firestorm by disclosing the private remarks of heads of state and candid observations by senior US officials. The US government slammed the disclosure of the documents by WikiLeaks, saying it threatened national security and the lives of foreigners working with the military and US embassies. WikiLeaks supporters view the site as a whistleblower that exposed US wrongdoing and see Manning as a political prisoner.